


don't turn away now

by deadhoods



Category: Check Please! (Webcomic)
Genre: M/M, POV Second Person, Romanticisation, Unrequited Love, from kent's perspective, self-indulgent angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-18
Updated: 2017-04-18
Packaged: 2018-10-20 08:56:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,314
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10659237
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/deadhoods/pseuds/deadhoods
Summary: On the night you win the Cup, he kisses you.It's not your first kiss, but that's okay. You don't think he remembers it anyway.





	don't turn away now

**Author's Note:**

> Wrote this in about one and a half hours because my thot ass wanted to write some self-indulgent tragic kent parson instead of finishing my eight million other works in progress because i love my boy.
> 
> warnings for romanticisation and general sad feels. #dicksoutforkentparson

On the night you win the Cup, he kisses you.

It’s not your first kiss, but every time he touches your mouth, it feels new and you feel like you’re fifteen and vulnerable, all over again. He waits until the guys have left and the reporters have gone, and then he pushes you against the wall and you curl your hand into the front of his shirt, tugging him closer. He touches the back of your neck, your cheek, the knuckles of your fingers as you cup his jaw, and then he murmurs, “Kent,” and kisses you. He is slow but he is not soft; as with everything he does, it’s entirely intense, and he scrapes his teeth on your bottom lip and you fall apart beneath him, like the snow in an avalanche.

It’s not your first kiss, but that’s okay. You don’t think he remembers it anyway.

His eyes are hazy and his pupils are blown when he pulls away. You chase his mouth and he smiles, this half-crooked not-smile-smile that makes your heart thump too hard in your chest every damn time, and indulges you once, before he says, “Later,” and you say, “Yes,” because you never say no to him. There’s never a reason to.

The team is waiting outside and Nicky says they’re going out to celebrate and tries to pull you along, but Jack catches your wrist and says, “We’re going back to the hotel." Jean wriggles his eyebrows at you as you blush to the tips of your ears. He makes you weak, he tears you down from inside out. You hide behind a façade and pretend you’re confident and you’re cocky and everything that you’re not because it’s easier to pretend than it is to be you, and when you’re with Jack, it all comes crumbling down. Because when you’re with Jack, there’s something that resonates inside you. Something like this bone-deep loneliness, an emptiness where the only thing you can hear is your own voice echoing _you’ll never amount to anything you’ll never be worth shit,_ and Jack, he understands. He knows. So, it’s fine when you’re you with him because you know he’ll understand.

You always share a room on roadtrips. It’s just always been like that, so it’s not a problem when he takes you back to the hotel you’re staying at and fucks you on the bed, messing up the sheets under your body. He kisses you for a long time, until you’re pliant and melting under his fingers. Your hands clench in the duvet, trying to ground yourself because he makes you feel like you're high, and then he kisses you on every inch of your skin as he rocks his hips and murmurs that he loves you into your sweat-damp cheek. When he comes, he says your name, and you bite his into his shoulder. Before he falls asleep, he kisses you, open-mouthed and deep, and some part of you thinks it might be like this forever.

It’s not your first kiss, but it’s your last, and that’s okay. You’re pretty sure he doesn’t remember it anyway.  
  


*  
  


Three weeks later, he tells you that he hates you, and you learn that Jack Zimmermann is a liar.

Over and over, in your head, you try to think of what you did wrong. There are a thousand reasons, and when he tells you to leave, you want to say no, but you don’t, because you never say no to him.

A year later, you’re playing for the Aces, and every time you touch the ice, you’re still wondering why.  
  


*  
  


It doesn’t feel right without him.

Everything feels wrong and sometimes you want to claw yourself out of your skin. You don’t belong here. Everyone is different from you. You’re nothing but street trash, and you don’t deserve any of this. It was never supposed to be you. It was always always always, from the beginning, supposed to be him.

But you don’t, and you smile bright for the camera, and you pretend everything is fine because you’ve always been good at that, pretending.  
  


*  
  


You are twenty-one years old.

You have everything in the world at your fingertips, except for the one thing you really want.

It’s a shame he doesn’t want you back.  
  


*  
  


 “Jesus,” laughs Swoops, hauling you up against him and leaning you on his shoulder, “I think you’ve had enough to drink tonight, Captain.”

You laugh back and let him pull you out of the bar, hailing a taxi with the arm that’s not wrapped around your waist. See, you’ve got this theory. The more drinks you have, the easier it’ll be to forget. You’re still testing that. Swoops nudges you in the ribs whilst you wait and teases, “Did you get rejected by a girl? Drinking to drown your sorrows, eh?”

You laugh again and pat his back. “Something like that,” you say. “One day you’ll understand, kiddo.”

He hates that nickname because he’s older than you, but at least he doesn’t leave you on the side of the road like he threatens to. The car ride back to your apartment sobers you up, and you’re not that drunk anymore when you take out your key and open the door. Swoops gets you a glass of water, making a shit-ton of noise in the kitchen that makes your head ache, and then he tucks you into bed and plants a wet, sloppy kiss on your forehead.

“You need me to keep the light on?” he asks from the hallway. “Is widdle baby Kenny afraid of the dark?”

You are. It’s an irrational fear that’s stayed with you since you were young and you’ve never been able to get over it. You used to sneak into your mom’s room at night and curl up next to her in her bed, even though it was barely big enough for one, and when you grew too big for that, she gave you her old teddy bear and told you it’d protect you from the monsters under your bed like it did her. Its ear was half-chewed off and it was missing an eye and you loved it all the same. You don’t have it anymore. You gave it to your sister. It runs in the family, you suppose.

“No, screw you,” you say, flipping Swoops off from the bed without sitting up, and you hear him snort from outside as he shuts the door and leaves.

You’re a great liar now. You learnt from the best, after all, didn’t you?

In the morning, you wake up and your mouth tastes disgusting. Your head feels like it’s being crushed by a compactor, but you still drag yourself out of bed and flop your entire body onto Swoops, who’s camped out on your nice leather Ikea sofa, to wake him up, and then you make coffee with two teaspoons of sugar and scrambled eggs and cereal because you can be a good captain sometimes. You ruffle his hair and say,  “Eat up, kid, so you can be big and strong and good at hockey like me,” and he chimes, “Okay, Dad!” and you go to the fridge to grab a bottle of orange juice so he can’t see the frown tugging at your mouth.

You remember everything. Every day, old memories are dredged up like pieces of broken driftwood washed in from the sea. You remember every single moment with him. You remember every touch on your arm, your legs, the weight of his hand on your knee, as if it were merely seconds ago, in the same way you know he doesn’t.

When will you learn?

That all of this is useless?

That all of this futile?

When will you understand?

You think you already do, but all the fibres in your body are born hoping.

So really, you don’t. And you never will.

You’re stupid and useless and you never learn. That’s just the way you are, you understand _that_ now.

“Dad, I want more cereal!” says Swoops, banging his spoon on the table.

You turn around and smile. “I’m getting Coach to trade you off to the Predators next season,” you say pleasantly, handing him the box.

He grins. “Great, then maybe I’ll finally know what it’s like to have a decent captain.”

You take a seat at the kitchen table just so you can kick him on the knees. He yelps and spills milk over your table and you make him clean it up with threats of extra laps every practice for the next five years.

None of this should be real and none of it feels right.

But you can’t change anything, you understand that too. You’ve tried.  
  


*  
 

You’re happy, sometimes.

It’s a weird emotion. Sometimes, you mistake it for guilt.  
  


*  
  


Things that remind you of him:

Expensive cologne because he’s the son of the man who’s your idol and a woman who used to treat you like her own child; a T-shirt he left behind one night that had a picture of a pineapple on it; the colour blue because it was his favourite and the colour of his eyes; the smell of freshly cut grass; old faded Polaroids you found in the box under your bed at home; outdated cinema stubs and the film _Titanic_ because you couldn’t believe he’d never seen it before and then he spent the whole time with his hand sliding up your thigh as he kissed you until you couldn’t feel your mouth anymore with the film playing in the background; every particle of air you breathe; the man that looks back at you in the mirror, and everyone that asks you if you’re friends anymore because you used to be so close, what happened?

 _I guess we just drifted apart,_ you always say.

It’s a bastardisation of the truth, but you will never tell them that. You don’t even want to believe it yourself.  
  


*  
 

“I miss you,” you whisper. “I miss you so much, every day, every second, so damn much.”

You know he’s there. You hear him breathing, one, two, three, down the phone.

“Please say something. Anything,” you say. You’re almost begging. You’d do it. “Jack, please.”

He says, “No,” and then he hangs up.

When will you fucking learn?  
  


*  
  


You aren’t sure when you first fell in love with him.

It just feels like you have been forever. You told him you didn’t give a shit that he was Bad Bob’s son and that he’d have to prove that he was good at hockey and not just some dumb assumption ‘cause everyone thought he would be. He grinned at you, which was weird because he rarely smiled, and it was wolfish and kind of dorky, and your chest felt a bit tight. He said, _Sure, Parson, bring it,_ and he beat your team in practice in the shootout. Afterwards, he bumped you on the shoulder and asked you if you wanted to come over some time and play on his Xbox. _Maybe we can be friends,_ he said, sort of awkwardly because he was the type of guy who didn’t have many friends, you could tell, and you said, _Only if you let me be player one,_ and there was that smile that did inexplicable things to your stomach.

It was only natural that it progressed from there.

There’s never been a moment since then when you haven’t been in love with him. It’s not just a feeling; it’s a state of being. It’s horrible and you hate it.

You want to know if it’s your fault. You want the chance to say sorry. You don’t need him to be in love with you in return anymore. You just want closure. You just want to know why. You cannot forget all those years like he can. You don’t need to feel his lips against yours anymore or your fingers linked between his, because you remember. You just need to know why.  
  


*  
  


It’s a bad idea but you’re good at having those.

He shoves you away and says, “You. Always. Say. That.”

Each word is punctuated with a sharp, angry breath. You thought he’d—you don’t know why he’s so angry. You just want to make things right and you don’t know why he won’t let you.

“Jack,” you say.

“Kent,” he says, and it’s plainly and simply earnest and tired. “One day,” he says, “you’re going to end up alone. No one’s going to love you and the only person who’s gonna be surprised is you.”  
  


*  
 

The thing is, people change.

But you don’t. You can’t change. And there’s probably a million reasons why you can’t be together, but the one thing that’s really stopping you? Do you know why he won’t ever love you back?

It’s because you’re selfish, and you can’t change.

You’re not confused anymore. You’re just lonely and twenty-five now and you hate yourself so much, but you can never bring yourself to hate him, and all you can think about is how you destroy everything you touch, and you think maybe it was destined to be like this from the beginning. It's been years since you cried. Some nights you're too numb to feel, and those nights are the worst.

Two people who are too alike can’t be together. You can try to force two puzzle pieces together, but they’ll never fit.

You think you understand now.

His picture never had you in it.

It’s kind of funny if you think about it, isn’t it? That you thought, all this time, that you meant something to him, but in the end, you never did. You never meant a damn thing to him, and that’s pretty funny, because he means everything to you.

He doesn’t need you anymore and you don’t need him, but you’ll always want him. Like you, that will never change.


End file.
